The Financial Times HTSI [IG] September 2026 autumn style issue is an ode to “beautiful chaos” living, and they head to Naples to showcase it. Why Naples? Anne will explain.

Supermodel Anja Rubik is styled by Isabelle Kourntoure, wearing Erdem, Givenchy, Gucci, Jean Paul Gaultier, San Laurent, Stella McCartney, Victoria Beckham and more, with images by Max Farago [IG]./ Hair by Sebastien Richard; makeup by Luciano Chiarello

This season’s key trends walk a wild path for HTSI: leopard print, wow shoes, shrunken knits, velvets, burnout laces and stains. The stains part is good. It reminds me of the customer sitting next to the shoemaker in the new Golden Goose stores, choosing their own scuffs style, degree of scuffing, and color tones of scuffing and then watching it being applied. That’s a strong bit of “beautiful chaos” thinking.

Living a True Grit, Spirited Life in Naples

Naples isn't just a picturesque but often grimy background for this editorial; it is the ultimate conceptual canvas for this specific debate. As someone who appreciates wordsmithing these intersections, I think of Naples as the visual thesis statement for this shift.

Naples is defined by striking contrasts. Naples layers Baroque palaces and historic churches alongside crumbling stucco walls, tangled laundry lines, and gritty, scooter-filled alleyways. It is a city where raw, street-level energy directly collides with aristocratic history. The theme of "beautiful chaos" requires a setting that rejects sterile perfection. Naples is famously alive, theatrical, and unpredictable — very much a scuffed shoes mentality.

The institutional voices who argue that "fashion is not about creating joy" often treat the craft like a solemn museum. Naples is the exact opposite: it is an open-air museum where ancient history is violently alive. You have thousands of years of art and architecture being aggressively brush-stroked by modern graffiti, roaring Vespas, and shouting voices.

Beautiful Chaos at Ralph Lauren

NYTimes Vanessa Friedman threw rotten tomatoes at the Spring/Summer 2027 Ralph Lauren collection this week, leaving me unsurprised. Vanessa was a bit over the top with her criticism, but Friedman is not driving style among the VICs.

This concept of “beautiful chaos” was very real in the new Ralph Lauren Spring 2027 show. The minute I saw Anja Rubik’s HTSI September 2026 Fashion Issue cover, its connection to RL declared itself.

Given the financial steamroller that Ralph Lauren is running worldwide, I don’t believe these folks at Ralph Lauren are a bunch of drunken sailors when it comes to design and merchandising. And they did send Polo Ralph Lauren designer Michael Rider to Paris, where he’s making big waves at Celine.

The Continuum: First Blazy’s ‘Joy’; now Lauren’s ‘Beautiful Chaos’

The first newday disruptor was Blazy blowing everything up at Chanel. I’m quite certain that recently Friedman did write ‘joy’ about fashion and Chanel. Late spring/early summer the critic sounded as if she’d just had her all of her wisdom teeth pulled on the same day. The critic did utter the word ‘joy’ in a statement about fashion and I say ‘bravo’.

Only a few luxury brands are making money worldwide in this moment. China fired off a significant cannon in July with its “the taxman cometh” declaration. Chanel is still running warm, if not scalding, in China. The brand on a torrid pace worldwide is Ralph Lauren, who is running a 31% [with estimates of 40+%] increase in China; 18% in Europe [surprise, surprise] and 8% in America.

It’s not only the clothes. Ralph Lauren has flexed a strong dose of humanity in its DNA in the last decade. And the marketing is superb. [Read: Polo Ralph Lauren at the US Open 2026 Campaign Lensed by Maya Skelton].

This fashion story sends a message that vibrancy and historical gravitas are not mutually exclusive. The editorial borrows this Neapolitan energy to show that high fashion doesn't lose its luxury status just because it embraces humanity’s often chaotic and frenzied reality. This a trend worth watching; and we will be doing just that.

If AI might destroy all of human civilization in the next 25 years, perhaps we all need to loosen up and live a little. ~ Anne